John le Carré doc debuts in Montreal

When people think of John le Carré, they probably picture him like one of the characters in his iconic spy novels — in a trenchcoat, under a fog-enshrouded street lamp, waiting for the handoff of an envelope of secrets.

But that wasn't the impression given Werner Kohne, one of the directors of King of Spies — John le Carré, which premiered at Montreal's International Festival of Films on Art.

"He comes very close to what one generally expects an English gentleman to be — humorous, self-deprecating, restrained and both courteous and friendly to his guests," the German filmmaker said in an interview.

But getting le Carré, whose name is the nom de plume of David John Moore Cornwell, to consent to participate in the film took almost as much effort as fictitious spy handler George Smiley expended in getting the notorious superagent Karla to defect.

It took a year to get the 78-year-old le Carré on board, Kohne said.

Once le Carré signed on, he was "very constructive and co-operative," Kohne said, but the author did lay down a few ground rules.

"He told us very frankly what he didn't want: to appear in the film as a fierce-looking man, standing in the rain in a loden coat.

"That was something the BBC wanted from him when they approached him about a project. He didn't want to be the author who is a transfer picture of his characters. He was completely against this kind of performance, as were we."

Worked with British Foreign Service

Le Carré, who studied at several posh British schools before being recruited by the British foreign service in 1959, started writing spy novels in 1961. He has published 21 books, including the Cold War masterpiece The Spy Who Came In From the Cold.

He says he spent a few ineffectual but formative years in British intelligence when he was young, writing his first three books while he was still a spy.

He cautions people that his writings are not to be taken as gospel on how an intelligence service works because he made it all up.

But le Carré's books touched a nerve, presenting a world that was grimmer and greyer than James Bond's, where grit and manipulation replaced gadgets and souped-up Aston Martins.

It's a view of spying that didn't always get rave reviews within the intelligence community, says Mikhail Ljubimov, a former agent for the Soviet KGB.

'[Le Carré] is also an outstanding chronicler of contemporary history who takes us behind the curtain of political performances to the place where the political symbolism of diplomacy is revealed and where life among agents is cold, dirty and murderous' —Filmmaker Werner Kohne

Ljubimov says in the Florianfilm/ZDF-Arte documentary that after he retired, he met many members of the British, French and German security services, many of them senior officers. They all had one thing in common when the subject of le Carré came up.

"They didn't like John le Carré," the Soviet agent said. "It's terrible. Why didn't they like him? Well, mainly it is the English secret service that dislike him because he describes the darker side of the English secret service too well."

Kohne said he followed le Carré's work for decades and enjoyed his "fascinating and thrilling espionage novels."

"Besides that, he is also an outstanding chronicler of contemporary history who takes us behind the curtain of political performances to the place where the political symbolism of diplomacy is revealed and where life among agents is cold, dirty and murderous," he said.

Kohne pointed out the Cold War, when the Soviet Union divided Berlin with an imposing wall, was especially palpable in Germany with families torn apart.

The erection of the Berlin Wall was among the events that spurred le Carré to write The Spy Who Came In From the Cold.

"That is an experience that John le Carré shared with us Germans," Kohne said. "But he also possessed the ability and a sense for the historic point in time that enabled him to turn this into an inspiring novel.

"From today's perspective, it almost seems that his novel, The Spy Who Came In From the Cold, put a seal on these events. That is something that an author rarely, rarely succeeds at." 

Kohne said he found it equally fascinating to see how le Carré in person could switch at a moment's notice from a charming, chatty storyteller to a sharp analyst of contemporary times.

"We got to know an angry old man who verbally castigates the American and British politics about Iraq because he is of the opinion that it is based on stupidity," Kohne said.

"It became obvious to us that he no longer feels the need to be considerate of political correctness. I found that very refreshing."

He was also taken by le Carré's loving relationship with his wife, which is a far cry from the troublesome and distant relationships of his characters.

"When we were in Cornwall, we climbed up the cliffs and he was slightly out of breath," Kohne said. "His wife was waiting for us at the top and when he arrived, she hugged him and, tightly embraced, they walked towards the car."

Kohne's next project will be a documentary about the Fugger, a mercantilist dynasty of the early modern age that used undercover agents for economic espionage.

"As you can tell, the subject of espionage is hard to shake off," he said.